A conventional glass sheet heating furnace includes a forming section having a glass sheet forming mold mounted on a movable shuttle and a glass sheet contacting cloth mounted on a cloth ring for covering the mold on which a heated glass sheet if formed. The cloth ring is changed when a glass sheet has been broken during the forming so that pieces of the fragmented glass are not imparted into a subsequently formed piece of glass. Changing the cloth ring requires attaching a frame to an annealing ring, opening a shuttle door in the furnace end wall, driving the shuttle to the end wall of the furnace, prying the cloth ring off using the annealing ring as a fulcrum, removing the cloth ring, driving the shuttle out of the furnace, replacing the cloth ring and reversing the procedure to install the new cloth ring.
This method of changing a cloth ring requires a visual determination that a glass sheet has broken and requires a significant number of steps to change the cloth ring.